If it does not want to remain complicit in Israel’s crimes, Canada must immediately apply all means of political and economic pressure at its disposal. There are many things it could do, including recognizing the State of Palestine, joining in actions before the international courts, terminating economic and military agreements, and breaking off diplomatic relations.

While warmongers worldwide are jubilant at the thought of profiting from the geopolitical upheaval, a spiral of violence would be devastating for the Iranian people and the entire region, as were the US-led regime change wars in Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan. A wider conflict would devour the Middle East and could spread beyond that region in terrifying ways.

Are we so morally bankrupt that we will allow Netanyahu’s cynical maneuver, an act of naked aggression in flagrant breach of international law, to divert us from our responsibilities to end Israel’s genocide in Gaza? From the first responses of Western political leaders, it would appear that the answer to this question is unfortunately an unhesitating and emphatic yes.

How can the Canadian Jewish left urge faith leaders and institutions to publicly stand against Israel’s genocide? As more and more Jews are realizing that Israel’s unrelenting war on Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank is not being waged to keep Jews safe, either in Israel or around the world, they are supporting the growing calls for aid and a ceasefire.

This is the end. The final blood-soaked chapter of the genocide. It will be over soon. Weeks. At most. Two million people are camped out amongst the rubble or in the open air. Dozens are killed and wounded daily from Israeli shells, missiles, drones, bombs and bullets. They lack clean water, medicine and food. They have reached a point of collapse.

One of the most remarkable—not to say shameful—features of the last 20 months of carnage in Gaza has been the near-unanimity of support for Israel’s assault from Western governments and political parties of otherwise sharply opposed persuasions, regardless of how criminally Israel has conducted its “war.”

Last week, virtually every attendee arriving at CANSEC—North America’s largest annual arms trade show—was met with the piercing cry of “war criminal,” as over 300 protesters gathered to denounce war profiteering and Canada’s complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Israeli armed forces and political authorities since October 7, 2023.

Who can be a fascist? Or a better question is: is any group of people inoculated against fascism, who can’t “catch” or succumb to it? Like Jews, perhaps? As the child of a survivor of Auschwitz, I am especially interested in this question. And my answer has always been the same: Suffering under fascism in no way immunizes any group against falling for it.

While in Gaza an intensifying series of air strikes killing hundreds of Palestinians does not constitute an act of war, the US is the victim of a “invasion” launched by Venezuela involving neither ground troops nor air power, but whose “devastating effects” nevertheless justify the suspension of normal due process rights. Truly we are living in the upside-down.

It is obvious that Israel does not allow itself to be bound by ceasefire terms, the UN, international law, or humanitarian law. It exists in a bloodthirsty state of exception, unrestricted by any law or agreement, its violent expansionism fuelled by ordnance from the very countries that claim to endorse a fair and transparent “rules-based order.”